Chickens and Bees Please!

"Then I realized that it is good and proper for a man to eat and drink and find satisfaction in his toilsome labor under the sun during the few days of life God has given him-for this is his lot. Moreover, when God gives any man wealth and possessions, and enables him to enjoy them, to accept his lot and be happy in his work-this is a gift of God. He seldom reflects on the days of his life, because God keeps him occupied with gladness of heart." Ecc. 5:18-20 (NIV)

Why should he reflect on the days which have passed that are filled with trouble? Give him a focus, a work, a purpose, and he will rise to show the Glory of God in all he does regardless of the circumstances to which he lives. Life is given as a gift and just as any gift could be used in ways unintended by the giver, so can life. Purpose - that is the word that describes my thoughts and with each piece of the puzzle known creates thousands more unknowns.

How can a man leave the rat race that he is part of, and go in the direction of his calling? One answer; "Trust in the Lord with all your heart and lean not on your own understanding; in all ways acknowledge him and he will direct your path"-Proverbs 3:5. Whether he falls or flies, he will be directed by the Lord and the Lord will be his Strong Tower and Mighty Deliverer so that no one can say that he works of his own accord but has the light of the Son shining on his paths.

As I write these words, I am filled with gladness and reverence because the Lord is good. "I lift my eyes unto the hills - where does my help come from? My help comes from the Lord, the Maker of heaven and earth. He will not let your foot slip - he who watches over you will not slumber; indeed he who watches over Israel will neither slumber nor sleep." Psalm 121
When we called out to the Lord, He heard us and showed his mercy on us.

It's hard to transition from a mood of satisfaction and praise to the Lord to one of giving information of the farm but the mood continues through the information because it is the information that created the mood.

We have sold our car and are able to get the things we need to get the bees and the Chickens going right away. If we are careful, we can make it last quite a while and even pay off two debts and have some savings.

A smaller than planned Chicken coupe was started but was never finished. Here is where it stands currently. I will probably use rocks for siding because itís free and I can get portlan and mix with sand which I can get from the creek and save a ton of money and keep the coupe cooler too (because I have a metal roof on it-because it was free). I should have room for nest boxes on 3 sides of the building and two tiers of them. I should have room for 20 or more nest boxes from a 5x5 building if I do it right.

We have had 70+ degree weather here so I was able to get the cold season crops planted and made progress on the Chicken coup and pen.

Brandy and I planted the Potatoes and Onions last week on Saturday the 8th.

This week I planted Broccoli, head and leaf Lettuce, Spinach, and Carrots.

Someone asked me: "how do you grow anything where all they grow is rocks?" So I told them. Hereís how. First, it depends on what you're planting. If its Onions or Potatoes, you don't do anything really special other than what they normally call for. Onions go strait in the ground and Potatoes need a deep area so that as they grow up you can pull the dirt over them and they will sprout spuds along the plant trunk after itís covered up. Now for other things like Lettuce Spinach and other finer seeds and less forceful plants, I did this last year and it worked well then so I am doing it again. I take and hoe out a trench, and then I sift some dirt (using half inch square hardware cloth) into a wheel barrel and in doing so I get rid of the rocks in my garden (though an insignificant amount) then put the sifted dirt into the trench about a couple inches worth, just enough for a seed bed. The plants grow and then can dig their way through the rocks once started.
Now for things like Carrots that need unobstructed growth down, I have a lot of work to do. Because people in this area do not usually grow carrots and sell them at the market because the ground is so rocky, I decided to put the effort into prepping the ground to grow Carrots and take advantage of the opening and possible premium price opportunity.

A day and a half later of this and I am done. Whew! You talk about back breaking. I was able to go 5 feet an hour sifting dirt in one row to make a place for Carrots. Hopefully my work will pay off.

Below is 60 feet of garden. I call it Plot 4 I have one other plot its size and another that's a little bigger. The row that says "Tomatoes-Broccoli" only has Broccoli in it right now but when its time I will plant the Tomatoes every 5ft. I have figured out that they are easier to get to and around when they are spaced more than 4ft apart. Planting these two together, like this, then having the carrots on one side, helps with the growth and creates a natural insecticide. Tomatoes compliment the Broccoli and visa versa. Carrots make Tomatoes grow better and help to ward off Tomato worms.

I am looking for old hoses that no one wants anymore. They can be full of holes or pieces of hoses because I will cut them up and poke holes in them anyway. The frugal way to make soaker hoses.

I have finished the Bee hive and purchased frames. I bought the plastic frames because I think they will last longer but they were more expensive but should pay off in the long run. During the icy spell we had a week and a half ago I was able to dust up the house sawing and Routing in the living room and finished the roof and the inner cover. You should have seen the mess - well okay, no you shouldn't. The inner cover took me more time than a box took because it was so small and the routing had to be exact or it would destroy the piece of wood, it was not fun. After we sold the car we could afford to get all the equipment and frames and $260 later I have this:

Before Painting-

Detail of roof vent to allow heat from roof to go out. The roof is filled with spray in foam to add insulation and keep heat down and it may help provide leak protection but I am not sure.

In this picture I am in the process of painting the hive. It rained that night and the next morning were little bubbles all over my paint. I let the sun heat it and dry it and all the bubble went a way...good thing because I thought I was going to have to sand it all and repaint it again. The only exterior paint that I had on hand was brown so I used it. From what I have read brown is okay to use but it will retain a little more heat than white. My hive will be in the woods so it should have decent shade. At least my hive wont stick out like a sore thumb and invite someone to steal it-that happened recently to a big time local bee keeper almost $80,000 worth of hives and equipment.

Here the hive is painted and assembled. I have one hive body and two supers - right now any way, I plan on finishing the other hive body so that I can have two brood chambers and two honey supers. If you look at the bottom box you'll see a white plastic thing on top of the frames and the box; that is the queen excluder. I don't want bee larva in my honey so I will use the excluder to keep her from laying eggs in the honey supers.

Another view of the hive.

I do need to put a piece of tin metal on top to keep from weathering my roof quicker than it should be but for the most part it's done. Now I just need to set it up in its pen and get some bees.

Here I am sporting my brand-new Bee suit and a really scarry grin.

McClurg was fun last Monday, there were some new people there I hadn't seen before. Ashley was tearing into a tune playing it at breakneck speed as always.

Everyone had a good time as always.


Well thanks for taking a look. Hope you enjoyed. Let me know if you have any questions.